Diarmuid O'Carroll

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Diarmuid O'Carroll
Personal information
Full name Diarmuid O'Carroll[1]
Date of birth (1987-03-16) 16 March 1987 (age 37)
Place of birth Killarney,[2] Ireland
Height 1.80 m (5 ft 11 in)
Position(s) Forward
Team information
Current team
St Mirren (assistant manager)
Youth career
1995–2002 Killarney Athletic
2002–2003 Home Farm
2003–2006 Celtic
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
2003–2008 Celtic 0 (0)
2007Ross County (loan) 15 (2)
2008–2009 Morecambe 29 (5)
2009–2010 Airdrie United 30 (5)
2010 Valur 6 (0)
2011–2012 Glenavon 33 (4)
2012–2014 Cliftonville 65 (12)
2014–2016 Crusaders 53 (13)
2018 Dungannon Swifts 4 (0)
Total 231 (41)
International career
2006 Republic of Ireland U21 4 (0)
Managerial career
2015–2017 Crusaders Strikers
2019 Glentoran Women
2019–2021 Motherwell U18
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Diarmuid O'Carroll (born 16 March 1987 in Killarney) is an Irish retired professional footballer, who is currently assistant manager at St Mirren. He has worked in various roles in football such as for the Irish Football Association as Club and Community Development Officer within the Football Development Department.

Club career[edit]

Diarmuid O'Carroll started his youth career with Home Farm[3] before joining Celtic's Youth Academy, he had featured for Celtic's reserve side for several years,[4] but did not play for the first team. In 2007, he had a loan spell with Ross County F.C. and, in July 2008, it was announced that O'Carroll had signed a one-year deal with English League Two side Morecambe.[5]

In the summer of 2009 O'Carroll had many trials, including one at Újpest FC, but he did not agree a deal with the Hungarian club. He played for Shamrock Rovers in their win over Hibernian F.C. in July but was not offered a contract[6] One month later he signed a one-year deal with Airdrie United.[7] Due to financial cutbacks at the club, he left in May 2010. O'Carroll then went on trial at Raith Rovers. He scored his first goal for Raith as a trialist away to Forfar Athletic in a pre-season friendly on 13 July 2010. On 30 July he signed for Icelandic side Valur where he also worked as a youth coach.[8]

In November 2010, after returning from Iceland O'Carroll signed a pre-contract agreement with Glenavon in Northern Ireland. He became eligible to play from January 2011.[3] In an Irn-Bru league cup match on 20 September 2011, O'Carroll scored a double hat trick[9] Until this time, he played for amateur side Dollingstown to maintain his match fitness.

He signed for Cliftonville on 3 January 2012 [1] and scored on his debut at Leonidas [2] O'Carroll also worked as a youth coach for the club's academy as well as a consultant for the agency The Copius Group.[10]

Later career[edit]

On 7 May 2014, O'Carroll was confirmed to have left Cliftonville after winning back to back league titles and league cups. He then joined Crusaders, signing a two-year pre-contract for the club. During his time at Crusaders as a semi-professional player, O'Caroll was also appointed manager of Crusaders Newtownabbey Strikers in April 2015 (left in January 2017).[10] On the expiration of this contract, Diarmuid had won 4 back to back titles with 2 clubs and then O'Carroll decided to retire from football to focus on coaching.

On 23 November 2018, O'Carroll came out of retirement, signing a short-term deal at Dungannon Swifts.

O’Carroll has completed a number of coaching badges and has a long-term ambition of pursuing this area after he retires from playing. On 27 February 2019, he was appointed manager of Glentoran Women.[11] He left the position in June 2019, to become the Director of Coaching for Downtown Las Vegas Soccer Club.[12]

On 23 September 2019 he took over the role of coach to Motherwell FC's Under 18s. This was a post that had briefly been filled by Darren O’Dea who had moved on to coach the under 18s with Celtic.[13]

On 7 June 2021, O'Carroll joined Morecambe as a first-team coach, joining Stephen Robinson after they had worked together at Motherwell.[14] On 9 January 2022, O’Carroll took charge of Morecambe in a 3-1 FA Cup defeat to Tottenham Hotspur, after manager Stephen Robinson tested positive for COVID-19 on the eve of the match.[15]

On 22 February 2022, O’Carroll was appointed as Robinson's assistant manager at St Mirren.[16] On 13 March 2023, O’Carroll joined Michael O’Neill's backroom staff with the Northern Ireland national team as a senior coach, whilst remaining in his assistant manager role at St. Mirren.[17]

International career[edit]

O'Carroll has been capped at every youth level and under 21 for Ireland, but has never played for the Republic of Ireland at full international level.[2]

Charity work[edit]

O'Carroll started his charity work by running a half-marathon in aid of Suicide Awareness in June 2010 in Belfast and continued that in October of that year by running the Dublin City Marathon for the same cause.[citation needed]

Honours[edit]

Cliftonville
Crusaders

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Diarmuid O'Carroll". Barry Hugman's Footballers. Retrieved 11 March 2017.
  2. ^ a b "O'Carroll stepping back to go forward". Irish Independent. 27 December 2009. Retrieved 12 September 2011.
  3. ^ a b "Glenavon sign former Airdrie striker Diarmuid O'Carroll". BBC Sport. 24 November 2010. Retrieved 12 September 2011.
  4. ^ "O'Carroll makes point with strike". celticfc.net. Archived from the original on 15 December 2007.
  5. ^ "Morecambe snap up Celtic striker". BBC Sport. 1 July 2008. Retrieved 1 July 2008.
  6. ^ "Report – Rovers 1 Hibernian FC 0". Archived from the original on 31 July 2009. Retrieved 4 August 2009..
  7. ^ "Striker O'Carroll joins Diamonds". BBC Sport. 22 September 2009. Retrieved 22 September 2009.
  8. ^ "O'Carroll, Diarmuid – The Celtic Wiki".
  9. ^ "Glenavon FC News | All the Official News from Mourneview Park | Page 3". Archived from the original on 1 April 2012. Retrieved 28 September 2011.
  10. ^ a b Diarmuid O'Carroll profile at LinkedIn, linkedin.com
  11. ^ Diarmuid O'Carroll is new Head Coach of the Cup Winners, glentoran.com, 27 February 2019
  12. ^ Downtown Las Vegas Soccer Club Welcomes Diarmuid O’Carroll, downtownlvsc.com, 29 June 2019
  13. ^ DIARMUID O’CARROLL JOINS COACHING STAFF, motherwellfc.co.uk, 23 August 2019
  14. ^ "STEPHEN ROBINSON ANNOUNCED AS NEW SHRIMPS BOSS". morecambefc.com. 7 June 2021.
  15. ^ "Managing against Spurs a career highlight: Former Cliftonville striker Diarmuid O'Carroll". The Irish News. 11 January 2022.
  16. ^ "ST MIRREN DELIGHTED TO ANNOUNCE STEPHEN ROBINSON AS NEW MANAGER". stmirren.com. 22 January 2022.
  17. ^ "DIARMUID O'CARROLL NAMED IN NORTHERN IRELAND BACKROOM TEAM". stmirren.com. 13 March 2023.

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